MICHAEL DEMPSEY - Cranfield University

Cognitive rules and culture
NUPE on NUPE NUPE on
NALGO
• We certainly didn't
use the expression
"member led" in
NUPE. I would say
that in NUPE our
General Secretary
and the Deputy had
a very strong and
good relationship
with their Executive.
I think there was a
lot more trust and I
think the NUPE
Executive were far
more inclined to
delegate
responsibility to their
officers (Interviewee
J)
• I was always quite
clear in NUPE what
my authority was. I
knew what I could
do and what I
couldn't do. It's a bit
difficult to describe
that in abstract
terms from a
distance but I felt
that I carried the
confidence of people
and of lay members
as well as senior
paid officers
because everybody
knew what you were
doing and what the
boundaries were
and what you are
expected to do and
provided you
delivered within that,
people let you get
on with it
(Interviewee A)
• In my last
conference as
NUPE National
Secretary, officers
spoke, two of us, as
many times as lay
members spoke.
There were 26 of
them and again
there was an
expectation that if
things went wrong,
the officers got the
blame. The officers
answered for the
committee in a
way.(Interviewee H)
• NALGO was a
bigger union and
from the outside
looking in it had a
bigger bureaucracy
and a more
interventionist NEC.
It was sometimes a
bit frustrating where
on the negotiating
team we could get
things cleared much
more easily, we
could get an earlier
decision out of them
that it seems at
times you could get
out of NALGO.
(Interviewee A)
• The view of the
NALGO senior
people, the senior
Unison people from
the former union,
the dominant, was
basically that we are
accountable to
conference as lay
members, the
officers aren't
accountable.
You've only been
around six weeks
and we don't think it
is appropriate for
you to answer for
the committee.
That's a matter for
us. (Interviewee H)
287
NUPE on
COHSE
• This year at the
health conference,
bear in mind that
the dominant
culture in health is
COHSE and NUPE
which was much
more a less
prominent role for
lay members in
both organisations
(Interviewee H)
NUPE on
UNISON
• Things are more
formal now. There
isn’t that sense of
love and trust
and…..we're all in it
together. Maybe
that's partly because
we are such a big
organisation.. In
NUPE our Executive
was 26 or something.
They could pick up
the phone…and
have a word with (the
GS) personally and
he very much had a
personal relationship
with all the members
of the Executive.
Hard to replicate that
in such a big
organisation now. I
do miss that.
(Interviewee J)
• Coming into Unison,
the shared zone, that
grey area, I still think
that is enormously
big and some people
have got their
blindfolds off but
there is still a lot of
areas where you
can't see your way
around it. I think
that…who controls
and rules is more a
question of
personalities than
any carefully thought
out executive type
structure.
(Interviewee A)
• Partnership working
is more than, in fact,
just a few words.
Applied rigorously…it
has been a
significant benefit. I
see it is now in the
context of the kinds
of relationships we
have, the real trust
that exists, the ability
in fact to reach
decisions which you
know then are going
to be supported.
That's a real
strength.
(Interviewee M)